Course info

What we think of as "race" is often regarded as a natural phenomenon (i.e. our genes define our race). This course instead looks at the process whereby the stories we tell about our different physical characteristics come to define what we understand by racial difference, and how systems of racial inequality that are presented as natural, are actually constructed by culture. There will be a specific focus on how American racial stratification is presented as being natural, when it is a historical human construction.